Air Lingus / Delay in flight and unable to contact anyone to complain to!

I wish to lodge a complaint regarding my flight Jersey, Chanel Islands, U.K. to Dublin Ireland on 16th June 2007. Flight E1245 was delayed for a considerable number of hours with no explanation offered to any passenger. The weather in Jersey was quite awful and the initial assumption was that flights were delayed due to bad weather. However the rain did not seem to interfere with any other flight so I inquired from airport officials and they did not know the reason for the delay. There was no Air Lingus representative present to whom I could direct an inquiry.

When on board, I asked a hostess and she informed me that there had been a ground-staff strike in Dublin airport from 6.00a.m. that morning. Why, as they had my telephone number on my booking form, did they not telephone me and advise me of this delay instead of causing me to sit in Jersey airport for hours and hours?

I an extremely cross with Air Lingus. I spent a lot of money on this short flight and cannot understand why they treated me so shabbily. Furthermore when I sent my complain by e-mail to the booking office, it was returned to me as 'failure to deliver' . I do not have any other contact address to write to, nor a telephone number, nor can I find any such detail.

I wish to lodge my dissatisfaction with Air Lingus and make a formal complaint about this.

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On the 3rd April we set off from Dublin for our dream holiday (just before
the recession sets in) to Florida, specifically Tampa where we would be
meeting our in-laws from the U.K. We had booked with Aer Lingus about six
months ago because we believed that our state airline would look after us
the best.
All was well until we landed at Boston where we were informed by an Aer
Lingus supervisor by the name of Anne O’Brien that our connecting Jet Blue
flight to Tampa had been cancelled. She was extremely dismissive, refused
to acknowledge that Aer Lingus had any responsibility for us despite the
fact that we had booked flights with Aer Lingus to Tampa. Her attitude was
quite frankly bewildering and she obviously had no training, experience or
sympathy dealing with distressed passengers. There was another couple from
Cork with three young children also involved who were very upset indeed. We
were informed that Jet Blue had cancelled our flight because of weather and
we would have to go into Boston and stay in Boston at our own expense for
the night and then ring the airport in the morning to see about flights to
Tampa. –No guarantees of a flight! We could not believe her attitude, in
turn, condescending, belligerent and rude. She then vanished for an hour
after we asked her to find the operations manager. (This man’s name
apparently was Des Farren. He did not meet with us, I don’t know why.) We
got the impression that she hoped we would go away, and she left her ground
staff alone to try and keep us calm! These girls were in fact pleasant
although they could do nothing for us. After an hour Ms. O’Brien returned
and surprisingly let it slip that the flight had actually bee cancelled
twenty four hours earlier! We had not been informed in Dublin before we
left although I’m not sure what we could have done about it if we had
known. We did not want to travel in to a strange city to find accommodation
and no help was offered in finding such a place. I then asked if it would
be possible to fly to Orlando (strange that the Air Lingus staff hadn’t
thought of this!) knowing it wasn’t that far from Tampa and after several
calls we were told this might be possible although this plane was likely to
be delayed. It would be necessary to hire a car in Orlando to get to our
eventual destination in Hudson. When I rang Hertz they quoted be $175
dollars for one day and as I had no choice I accepted. Extraordinarily
enough no other flights from Boston were cancelled but our flight to Tampa.
When we went to check in for the Orlando flight at the Jet Blue desk we
were informed that the Tampa flight had indeed been cancelled twenty four
hours earlier because of bad weather in New York at that time and that was
where the plane was coming from. Unbelievable! How did they know the
weather would be so bad the next day and in fact we know for a fact that
flights did get out of New York that day-3rd of April (our in laws flew out
of New York.) Obviously there were other factors involved in this
cancellation.
Of course our eventual flight to Orlando was delayed and we did not fly out
of Boston until 21.30.(No refreshments offered despite the fact that we
were in Boston Airport for 5 and half hours.) We didn’t arrive at our
eventual destination until 4 in the morning. We had been travelling for
twenty four hours, an exhausting start to our dream holiday. Basically Air
Lingus should pick up the cost of our car hire and I will enclose copies of
receipts with the copies of the letter I will send to you by post. I am
also sending copies of this letter to the C.A.A., my solicitor and The
Irish Times.
In these days of recession I cannot believe that an Airline could be so
callous to the needs of their customers. Negative word of mouth is the very
worst thing a company can afford in this day and age. I trust that you will
be able to give us compensation to whit, the cost of the car hire. I look
forward to your response.

To summarise
We flew out to Boston on flight EI 137
Our cancelled flight was Jet Blue B61239 due to leave at 18.30 approx.
The name of the disagreeable supervisor in Boston was Anne O’ Brien
We had purchased flights to Tampa from Air Lingus and had no interest in
being in Boston. How could the supervisor(above) not understand this.
We had no contract with Jet Blue
The weather was not an issue in Boston. We were initially lied to.
The flight was in fact cancelled a full 24 hours before its scheduled
leaving time from New York. We know flights left on the 3rd April. Strange
that a flight should be cancelled before you could be sure what the weather
would like. Our in laws flew out of New York that afternoon. We believe the
flight was cancelled for other reasons and we were told it was the weather
just to fob us off. –Really we are not that stupid!
Why were we not informed of this cancellation before we left Dublin?
Our eventual flight to Orlando meant we were in Boston airport for 5 and
half hours. We were offered no refreshments.
I felt it would be cheaper to hire a car and get on our way than pay for a
hotel in an expensive city(Boston) we knew nothing about.
I believe it is reasonable for Air Lingus to refund the money $175 for the
car hire.
This letter will be sent in the first instance by email to